Hinsdale Elementary School District 181 is finding out that building a new school is not a sure thing–even after taxpayers have approved the funds.
The district received authority to issue $12.8 million in bonds in a referendum issue in November and wants to go ahead with construction in Clarendon Hills’ Prospect Park for a 650-pupil middle school to ease overcrowding.
District 181 owns land in the park but wants to swap parcels with the Clarendon Hills Park District. The school land on the south side along Norfolk Avenue sits on a peat bog. The district wants to build along Chicago Avenue on the park’s north side where the soil is better.
School Supt. David Hendrix said the district would save money on the north site. On the south site, the costs would be higher because of the need for a firmer foundation, which might require sinking caissons into the peat bog.
In October, the Park Board said it would negotiate a land swap for a Chicago Avenue site if the school district could show it has the money for construction, owns the land on the park’s south end and proved it could build a school there that would not cause flooding problems.
The Village of Clarendon Hills, school district and Park Board held a joint meeting last week at Hinsdale Central High School to discuss the issue.
William Oelman, school board president, said the district has the cash. Paul Millichap, its attorney, reported that Chicago Title & Trust Co. did a title search and concluded District 181 does own the 11.5 acres of park land it claims. Charles Hulse, a Naperville engineer, said a new school along Norfolk Avenue would not cause flooding problems.
Furthermore, Hendrix presented a sketch showing how the school could be built on 2.5 acres, avoiding drainage and maintenance easements on the parcel. Prior agreements prohibit any construction on the easements.
“We don’t want to build a school there,” he said, saying the sketch was made only to respond to the Park District’s request to show it could be done along Norfolk Avenue.
But John Krepp, who lives next to the park, said that homeowners have hired a lawyer to represent them and contended that District 181 ownership of all the 11.5 acres is still unsettled.
Rick Tarulis, the Park District attorney, said another office of Chicago Title & Trust Co. “came up with different answers,” questioning whether the school district owns every parcel of the 11.5 acres.
Attorneys will try to get the title search company to agree on one view of whether District 181 owns all the land.
And John Steeves, the park board president, said it is hiring its own engineer to give a second opinion on whether a school along Norfolk Avenue could cause flooding, a key issue for nearby residents.
“We have a time problem,” Hendrix said. If a new middle school is not opened by August 1999, increasing overcrowding of 6th, 7th and 8th graders will require program cuts. The district’s Hinsdale Middle School has 1,000 children and 14 portable classrooms.
Hendrix said District 181 is not “strong-arming” the Park District into a land swap. “We own property,” he said. “We need to build.”
If there is no land trade, school district officials have said the school will be constructed along Norfolk Avenue.
“This Park District is not going to chain itself to bulldozers,” Steeves said.
He pledged to ask the Park District to begin land swap talks with the school district after the ownership and flooding questions are settled to its satisfaction.
But Clarendon Hills residents living near Prospect Park urged Steeves to take all the time needed to resolve the issue.
Donald Kimball, Clarendon Hills Village Board president, said the goal is to “minimize detriments and maximize benefits of the school to the village.”
Residents asked school district officials whether they plan to renovate Hinsdale Middle School.
Hendrix said district priorities are to build a second middle school, then consider the issue of overcrowded elementary schools for kindergarten through 5th-grade children.
